About You ✸ Paul Mescal

O2O'

MAY 11TH 2023
3:18 AM

Orla Finneran was by nature a jealous bitch.

Her therapist had said it stemmed from her father and half brothers, the constant battle for his attention. The fact she was a girl did not help, neither the fact that they were all at the very least ten years older than her. Most children in their teen years, when arguing with the parent of the same sex bond closer to the parent of the opposite sex, but Orla couldn't really do that.

She was possessive, she knew that, her dead father was to blame for it. Paul being flirted with angered her far more than she'd ever admit. Paul rarely noticed her glaring daggers at a woman who smiled at him for a moment too long, Or touched him too softly. On the rare occasion he did notice he didn't exactly mind it, in his mind it was nice to know he was wanted so much that someone was jealous of others seeing him.

Recently, Orla felt as though that feeling of possessiveness, the words 'he's mine. back off'  in some variation or other echoing in her head, had intensified. Perhaps it was her general state of irritation with life but she felt ten times more possessive of Paul. They weren't even together so she didn't have any right to be, at least that was how her mother had phrased it.

Orla adored her mother but Siobhan had been raised in a (majority of the time anyway) stable home so she never quite understood her daughters feelings surrounding her childhood and her behaviours because of that.

She couldn't understand that Paul had been one of the few boyfriends, or even people she'd had who had the decency not to flirt with her friends and focus their attention fully on her when she needed it. He was hers, and she was his.

Orla wanted to be with him, he was just oblivious to it, perhaps he loved her too, he had drunkenly said he did after they'd slept together. He hadn't remembered it though, or if he had he had yet to say anything.

"Orla, have you got the code?" Paul asked her, snapping her out of her thoughts. Orla nodded and opened her phone, the Q-R Code for their extended-stay parking. Orla passed her phone to him, oblivious to the notification from Ella.

Paul looked down to the phone and saw the notification, from WhatsApp that said "Stop being a fucking idiot and tell him you don't just wanna shag his brains out you wanna be w him. I'm hardly the cunts biggest fan but you're like a lovesick puppy it's exhausting for me and tilly to keep up w."

Paul read the notification over twice before it went away, he placed Orla's phone underneath the scanner looking between it and the screen. Once the screen confirmed the code was accepted Paul dropped his car keys into the hole for it and walked off. "Can I have my phone back?" Orla asked.

Paul nodded and handed it over again. As they got onto the bus that took them from the parking zone to the entrance of the airport he deliberated what to do. Ivy was sat on her mothers hip for the entire bus ride, refusing to be held by Paul because his hands were too cold. Orla was more than happy for Paul to sort all the log-in details out she planned on

The message was very obviously about him, Ella had been very close to Daisy and Orla for many years and still maintained that she thought Paul was an insufferable Maynooth prick. And as far as he was aware Orla wasn't sleeping with anyone else, she frankly wouldn't have the time to.

Once they'd gotten to the airport Paul had gotten them checked into the flight and then walked up to security. The line was disastrously long, Orla let out a visible groan. "Need to Pee." She groaned sleepily, in her defense it was half past four in the morning. "We can get done with this, go to the toilet, check a few shops and go straight to the gate on the ticket." Paul told her, Orla had no idea how he was so fucking alert.